was important and well-intentioned, but I think it drew the wrong conclusion.
Alexandra Howell's letter on Thursday, Women must expand knowledge to avoid sexual assault was important and well-intentioned, but I think it drew the wrong conclusion. The Matthew Kulchar case and the non-guilty verdict does show us some important problems. For example, we should be concerned that there were no sexual assault advocates available to help the plaintiff through the reporting and examination process at the time of the incident.
We should work on stopping unethical defenses that focus on smearing the accuser and trying to bias the jury with irrelevant stories about accuser's sexual history or past relationships. We should be looking at possible limitations and inequities in the justice system. We should even, in fact, try to educate the men on campus about what rape is, how to not do it and erase the myths that rape can be a gray area or is only really rape if it's really violent.
As Howell suggests we teach women, we should also teach men not only on the differences between consensual and non-consensual sex but on the true dynamics of a relationship.
What is not as helpful is to tell women to just be more careful and smarter all the time. Of course everyone, men and women, should do what whatever they need to do to be safe. But the plaintiff in this trial, like most rape victims, knew the defendant - it's difficult to figure out who might betray you. Women are always going to have to trust someone. Which means that, no matter how educated they are, they're always going to be vulnerable to somebody who can hurt them. What we should be learning from this trial is not to put all the problems of protecting themselves on women yet again, but to fix the legal and societal problems that allow people to possibly rape and get away with it.
Darcy Higgins is a junior studying political science.
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Opinion
Letter to the Editor
